Pinot Noir Los Carneros, Robert Sinskey 2017 75cl

Robert Sinskey has farmed organically in Carneros for more than three decades — solar-powered winery, biodiesel tractors, sheep and chickens working the cover crops. The vineyards are certified organic, and that hands-on, low-intervention philosophy is the whole point of this Pinot Noir.

Carneros sits at the cool southern end of Napa, where fog and wind off San Pablo Bay keep everything fresh. This 2017 is drawn from all five of Sinskey's Carneros sites, blended from 19 separately fermented lots and aged 12 months in French oak, only a third of it new. The 2017 season was a dramatic one — a wet winter, then a late-summer heat spike — but the fruit was picked at night and safely in by early September, well before that year's wildfires.

The estate's notes run to ripe red berry and plum lifted by lavender, flowering sage and blood orange, with a spicy edge of cinnamon and cardamom. There's a playful juiciness to the palate before it turns more serious, the polished tannins giving backbone to a long, mouth-watering finish. It has that Carneros trick of feeling generous and savoury at the same time.

At £50 this is characterful California Pinot with real farming behind it — not the cheapest way to buy Pinot, but a genuinely distinctive one, and it is drinking beautifully now with a few years still in hand.

How to Serve

Serve lightly cool, around 13 to 14°C, in a Burgundy bowl. A brief 30-minute decant lifts the aromatics; it needs no more.

Where to Drink It

Dandy in Maltby Street for its ingredient-led plates. J Sheekey for Pinot with fish. Bibendum for something a touch more classic.

Food Pairings

Roast salmon or seared duck breast both sit right in its wheelhouse. Mushrooms on toast, done well, are a quieter pleasure with it.